


the irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired

by jellyryans (ryankellycc)



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Surprises, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day Fluff, and Daichi's smile as a balm to heal all wounds, featuring Nishinoya Yuu as a modern day prophet, no plot only feelings and self-realization
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-15
Updated: 2020-02-15
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:01:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22697557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ryankellycc/pseuds/jellyryans
Summary: Nishinoya says anything can happen on Valentine's Day. Ennoshita has to admit that he's right.Written forEnnofor Valentine's Day 2020!
Relationships: Ennoshita Chikara/Sawamura Daichi
Comments: 6
Kudos: 33





	the irresistible desire to be irresistibly desired

Ennoshita saw the example problem like he’d traveled back in time.

He saw how the variable moved, line by line, until the parenthesis, exponents, fractions, and radical symbol of the square root had disappeared and left them with a single, straightforward number. He remembered the exact way the teacher stood at board and looped his Arabic numerals with the slight flick of his wrist as he erased stray marks with the edge of his shirt sleeve. 

Unfortunately, those stockpiled memories were about as useful as a wool blanket on a hot day. Remembering the color of his teacher’s socks wouldn’t change the laws of mathematics. His answer would still be wrong. 

His tablemates weren’t doing much better. 

On his left, Nishinoya’s tongue peeked out from between his teeth as he doodled on the worksheet his English teacher had made him redo for the third time, and, on his right, Tanaka stared down at a chunk of text in a way that made Ennoshita question whether or not he was even seeing the words. 

Doubt in the shape of the quadratic equation scratched at the inside of his skull like an animal desperate for its freedom.

“Thanks for taking charge of those two idiots. If they don’t pass their tests today, we’ll have to re-think our strategies for the practice matches next weekend.”

“It’s not a big deal, Daichi-san,” Ennoshita said. He’d been helping his classmates all year, and their study sessions had become routine enough that his mom usually had snacks ready for five before he’d even announced how many of his fellow second-years would be joining them. 

It was, truly, the least he could do.

Daichi paused with his lips pressed into a thin line, and Ennoshita counted down the seconds until he’d falter under the intensity of his scrutiny. “It is a big deal, though. I’ve got my hands full with your kouhai.” He scratched at the back of his head with a pained grimace. “And your senpai, if I’m being totally honest.”

“Really, it’s no problem,” Ennoshita said. He tried to mimic the way Daichi smiled at the team when they needed an emergency dose of fortitude, but the attempt fizzled. It was hard to imagine how his naturally downcast eyes could accommodate Daichi’s disarming expression. “I’m just glad I can help.”

“You help in a lot of ways,” Daichi said. Ennoshita didn’t want to say he looked fond, because labeling something as fond implied a thousand things he wouldn’t be able to identify. “I don’t know where we’d be without you,” Daichi continued. “Nishinoya and Tanaka operate on a totally different level than the rest of us, and you’re able to meet them wherever _that_ is.” He chuckled, closing his eyes to welcome the full breadth of his smile. “And then drag them kicking and screaming back to the real world.”

He tried not to think of just how much he wanted to wade in the warm, welcoming depths of that specific memory and focus on figuring out why his answer didn’t match the number in the answer key, but his thoughts were not interested in being corralled, and he wasn’t about to follow them. They were in the real world, and the real world demanded correct answers.

Tanaka slumped forward until his forehead rested on the open page of his workbook. He mumbled into the paper, interrupting his internal lecture. “We can’t respond if we can’t hear you,” he said. 

Tanaka turned his head to face Ennoshita with his cheek still on the page. “I’m not gonna be able to concentrate tonight.”

“Me neither,” Nishinoya whined. He leaned back on his hands and blew a loud raspberry toward the ceiling. 

“It’s cruel and unusual punishment to have a test on Valentine’s Day,” Tanaka said with a frown. “How can we give 110% to school when we could be approached by a girl at _literally_ any moment?”

Ennoshita snorted, fully embracing any conversation that didn’t involve thinking about fond looks and gracious volleyball club captains. “When have you ever put that much effort into classwork?”

“No fair,” Tanaka whined. He thrust his arm out in Ennoshita’s direction in order to smack him, but his hand fell short and slapped against the surface of the kotatsu instead. “You seriously can’t tell me you’re not excited for tomorrow.”

Ennoshita didn’t have to put much effort into maintaining a neutral expression. Valentine’s Day was just another day in the long string of days that marked the passage of the Earth around the sun, a manufactured holiday that required ridiculous fiscal expenditures and catered mostly to women. Ennoshita was neither a woman nor had much interest in getting confessed to by a woman, and he certainly had feelings about the idea that having one single day when women could express themselves without fear or anxiety of retribution could make up for centuries of patriarchal oppression. 

But Tanaka hadn’t asked him for a rant, and he wasn’t about to derail the miniscule amount of individual academic progress they might make that evening, so he answered without a fuss. “Not really.”

Nishinoya and Tanaka’s jaws went slack.

“I feel like I don’t even know you,” Tanaka said, shaking his head. 

Nishinoya vibrated with potential energy, wide-eyed, like a kitten about to pounce. All that was missing were the dilated pupils and waggling rear-end. “But anything could happen on Valentine’s Day!” 

“Or nothing could happen,” Ennoshita said calmly. “Just like nothing has happened for the last decade and a half of our lives.”

“Geez Chikara,” Tanaka said with a pout. “When ya put it like that.”

Nishinoya remained undeterred. He straightened his back and lifted his chin. “Even if nothing else happens, Yacchan will definitely make us chocolates. She even showed me pictures of the molds she bought with Kiyoko-san last weekend.”

“Did Kiyoko-san touch the molds?” Nishinoya nodded so vehemently that Ennoshita was concerned for his neck. “Hold up,” Tanaka said, “Does that mean if Yacchan makes us chocolate with those molds, it would basically be like getting indirect chocolate from Kiyoko-san?”

“What else could it mean?!”

Tanaka whooped and raised both of his hands to Nishinoya, who met him half-way over the table for a perfectly synchronized high-five. 

The muscles around Ennoshita’s eyes strained to twitch, and he had the fleeting thought that telling Daichi-san about this conversation might make him laugh. Then again, there was also a chance that he would agree with them. The thought curdled in the back of his mind like sour milk. “Let’s just get back to work,” he said.

“What if we beg Yacchan and Kiyoko-san for chocolates in the morning and eat them really fast so we get sick?” Nishinoya stage-whispered. 

Tanaka caught on disturbingly fast and finished Nishinoya’s thought in an equally dramatic whisper. “So we’ll get indirect chocolates _and_ get out of our English test because we’ll be sick from the chocolates!”

“Great plan,” Ennoshita deadpanned. “I’m sure Daichi-san’ll be thrilled when you miss afternoon practice.”

Their collective groan sounded rehearsed, which was an idea that didn’t bear considering, but name-dropping Daichi did have the intended effect. Nishinoya went back to his worksheet and Tanaka started marking passages with a highlighter.

Ennoshita breathed a quick sigh of relief, and the next time he looked down at his math problem, he realized he’d copied it down wrong. 

Valentine’s Day passed like any other day.

Yachi did give them chocolate, and Nishinoya shoved all of his candy all in his mouth so fast he drooled all over the floor. Neither he nor Tanaka got sick, but they succeeded in making everyone else sick with their gratuitous displays of appreciation. Ennoshita spent the morning as he usually did, worried that he would lag behind. 

He sat in his assigned seat after morning practice and alternated staring at a white board with staring down at an exam paper until he had to use the restroom or shuffle to the science room. He wasn’t sure how Nishinoya and Tanaka did on their exams, but he managed to work himself up enough about his own exams that he was weighed down with concern that his anxiety would distract him during afternoon practice.

When classes finally ended, Nishinoya and Tanaka bounced off the walls and burst into the gym with hearts in their eyes like they’d gotten their combined weight’s worth of romantic chocolates instead of their scant armful of obligatory candy. Ennoshita followed behind with Kinoshita and Narita. They slipped into the gymnasium without a single note of fanfare.

Practice itself was grueling, and the sun had long since set by the time he was retying his shoes on the steps of the gym with every intention of collapsing in bed as soon as humanly possible, but the toes of a familiar pair of trainers made him look up. 

“Daichi-san?” 

“Hey.”

He blinked in shock at the plastic bag containing three molded chocolates, tied off neatly with a curly red ribbon, that was held out to him. “Why do you have Yachi’s chocolates?” He asked. 

Daichi pulled the side of his mouth into a playful smirk. “The question should be, why don’t you have _your_ bag of Yachi’s chocolates?”

“What?”

“You left it on the bench in the club room,” Daichi explained. He shook the bag of chocolates in Ennoshita's direction. 

“Oh,” he said dumbly, immediately remembering that he had taken them out to slip his uniform into his bag so that he wouldn’t crush them. He took his chocolates back; they were well done, he noticed again, and obviously made with care. His heart sank, and it was definitely from the guilt of almost leaving them behind and not because the irresistible image of Daichi holding chocolates out to him on Valentine’s Day might force him rethink his entire stance on the holiday. “Thanks,” he said in a weak voice.

Daichi grinned, his cheeks dimpling in a way that made Ennoshita’s throat go dry. “My pleasure. I’d hate for Yachi to find out one of us left her hard work behind.”

Ennoshita nodded, averting his eyes. He spent a lot of time with Daichi but they were rarely alone, and each passing second only convinced him further that one-on-one conversations were better left to his imagination. There, he could at least pretend to give full-sentence responses. He got up to leave, but Daichi moved with him.

They walked a few steps toward the front of the school when Daichi spoke again. “You know, it feels good to be the one giving chocolates on Valentine’s. I can see why the girls go all out with it.”

Ennoshita had the sneaking suspicion that he was missing something, like he’d butted into the middle of a conversation, but he was dizzy from chasing his mind in circles. “I guess I never thought about being the one to give them out.”

“Me neither,” Daichi said with a gentle huff of laughter. “Not until I gave them to you.”

When he would replay the conversation in his head later that night, he’d be torn between praising his own obliviousness and kicking himself for not asking what exactly Daichi had meant. In the moment, banter offered its hand with the opportunity to fall back into familiar conversational territory, and he took it like a drowning man being offered a lifejacket. “You didn’t really give me chocolates, though,” he said with a wry smile.

“You’re absolutely right,” Daichi said, and then, without missing a beat, “But there’s always next year.”

Ennoshita never thought he’d see the day when he would welcome Tanaka’s dinosaur-sounding shriek, but Daichi turned his head in the direction of the noise with a loud sigh and missed the way his breath hitched. 

“Of course,” Daichi muttered with an uncharacteristically deflated look. “I guess the responsible thing to do would be to check up on him. You’re off the hook tonight.”

“Thanks,” Ennoshita rasped. He cleared his throat. “And for the chocolates, I mean.” 

“Oh.” Daichi’s lips parted in surprise, like he’d expected Ennoshita to have forgotten already. “Yeah, any time.”

He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes, and something inside him burst. 

He was _tired_. He was tired of thinking and tired of trying to control his thoughts and tired of getting upset when those thoughts did whatever the hell they wanted to do anyway. He was tired of feeling like he was always stumbling three steps behind, like he was a doormat to the comings and goings of his own life. He located Nishinoya and Tanaka’s mysterious plane of existence and dug his heels in, just for a moment, just long enough to succumb to impulse. “There’s still White Day,” he blurted. 

The outdoor school lights reflected in Daichi’s eyes like stars twinkling in the clear winter sky and his smile finally came alive. It grew until it was wide enough to dimple his cheeks. Ennoshita succumbed again; this time to the irresistible desire to click the mental shutter of his photographic memory.

“Better not get my hopes up,” Daichi said, “Now you should take off before you’re caught up in whatever nonsense is going on in the club room.”

When he turned away with another smile over his shoulder, Ennoshita shook his head with the stupid thought that Nishinoya had been right.

**Author's Note:**

> And now for something completely different! Hope you enjoyed my second attempt in as many years to make you smile on Valentine's!
> 
> Thank you (all) for reading!


End file.
